When comparing XCOM: Enemy Unknown vs Armello, the Slant community recommends XCOM: Enemy Unknown for most people. In the question“What are the best Turn-Based Tactics games on Steam?”XCOM: Enemy Unknown is ranked 6th while Armello is ranked 12th. The most important reason people chose XCOM: Enemy Unknown is:

Resource management feels like a juggling act, in the best way possible. Users have to make hard decisions on what options to give priority to, as they all will effect gameplay in some manner.

Pros

Pro

Effective resource management mechanics

Resource management feels like a juggling act, in the best way possible. Users have to make hard decisions on what options to give priority to, as they all will effect gameplay in some manner.

Pro

Death is permanent

Death is very permanent in XCOM, meaning if a player looses a high level player mid game that they may have a pretty tough time advancing past that point.

Pro

Assortment of add-on content available

There are quite a few add-ons available for XCOM, including the Enemy Within expansion pack.

Pro

Beautiful graphics

Tilt-shifted visuals look like a real board game. Beautiful particle effects and environments. Artwork is great and has a Redwall feel to it.

Pro

Original Mechanics

Equipment, spells, and traps are all played by expending cards, which can also be spent on favorable dice rolls in combat. The King, at the center of the board, simultaneously loses health and becomes stronger with corruption each turn. The win conditions depend on either killing the king, curing the king with spirit stones, becoming more corrupt than the king, or having the most prestige from quests and combat when he dies.

Cons

Con

Proper choices not obvious until after the fact

Choices that effect the game are not obvious when they are happening and once realized is too late.

Con

Games can be too short

The King has a limited amount of health and loses 1 HP every two turns, putting a hard limit on game length and limiting the amount you can achieve in a single game.